


Earthside

by cloudboy



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers - Bumblebee (2018)
Genre: Brief Profanity, Gen, I think Dropkick's a little underappreciated okay, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow To Update, UA [universe alteration] - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-28
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2020-10-30 00:41:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20805653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudboy/pseuds/cloudboy
Summary: A series of mishaps sees Dropkick separated from Shatter during atmospheric entry - oh, and also, he lands halfway across the continent from their destination. Plus he's got an irritating injury to deal with. Fantastic.It'll be fine, he guesses...as long as he doesn't run into any squishies.(Spoiler alert: he does.)





	1. Chapter 1

_Clang!_

_CLANG!_

Dropkick’s efforts were rewarded, and the damaged pod scraped open like some kind of metallic, alien flower. In somewhat of an anger-tinted daze, he cautiously stumbled out, favoring his injured ankle and taking in his surroundings.

So this was Earth. It had a very particular smell about it that Dropkick wasn’t sure he liked—sweet, almost, with a hint of foreign metal. He wondered how in Primus’ name Bumblebee had found his way to such a miserable, primitive, and backwater planet. Huffing, Dropkick turned his attention to the night sky, scanning for Shatter’s pod. Nothing was registering, but he wasn’t concerned; perhaps the solar flare they’d unintentionally fallen victim to as they approached Earth had set her back.

“Fraggin’—!” Dropkick cursed suddenly, falling clumsily forward into the weird alien grass and letting loose an impressive string of colorful expletives. He’d put too much weight on his ankle, and damn, it hurt like the pits. Rolling over, he scooted back until he was leaning against the pod and inspected the offending joint.

Dislocated—not too badly, thank Primus, but it was better to reset it while he was still in pain. _Of course, this all could have been avoided if my fraggin’ _pod_ hadn’t been faulty, but whatever, _he griped to himself, gritting his teeth and jerking his foot back into place with the practiced ease of a warrior who had seen and suffered far worse. For all the misfortunes that had befallen him, he was actually quite lucky. The resulting limp would certainly be a hassle, and transforming would be a pain, but it would be fine so long as he didn’t overwork it. Maybe Shatter’s pod had a first-aid kit—_like they were all supposed to._

The empty field he’d landed in didn’t provide much in the way of entertainment, and Dropkick rapidly grew impatient as he waited for the pain in his ankle to subside. _Where is she? _he wondered, optics scanning the sky and hoping to find a falling star. How had she fallen so far behind? Admittedly, he had no idea how far ahead he’d been to begin with, but they’d kept in contact, and everything had been going smoothly until that primedamn solar flare—wait.

An already-malfunctioning pod, plus a decent-sized flare...something akin to panic began to settle on him as he put the pieces together. The reason he couldn’t see Shatter’s pod was because she had probably already landed, just nowhere near his location. His pod’s navigation had been fried by the eruption, but he had hoped that he’d be able to at least somewhat maintain his current trajectory as he entered the atmosphere. It appeared that hope had been grossly misplaced.

_Calm down, Dropkick,_ the more unflappable part of his brain scolded. _Just comm her. She can give you her location, and then you can meet up. Simple. _

Dropkick vented out. The calmer part of him was right; he had been through worse, after all, and being lost and alone on an alien world came nowhere near making it onto that list. _::Shatter,:: _he said, activating his comm. _::Do you read me? Shatter, come in.::_

There was crackly static, immediately followed by a high-pitched ringing tone, but no response. Dropkick didn’t need to try again. He already knew his comm was busted; this had happened once before, and he’d learned that when it made that sound, it wasn’t going to function properly until it was properly repaired. He was on his own.

“Uggggggh,” he groaned aloud, clunking his head back and closing his eyes. Just his luck. There was no point in trying to be optimistic about things anymore; for all he knew, the Earthling natives were essentially scraplets with barely enough intelligence to construct a sad, trashy infrastructure (if it could even be called that) in the upper atmosphere. Or perhaps they were each the size of Metroplex, which was almost preferable because he wasn’t going to be outrunning scraplets any time in the immediate future on that ankle. Even if his alt could...well, he just would rather not have to deal with scraplets. He took some solace in the fact that he hadn’t encountered any yet, whatever it was they looked like, and he hoped that he wouldn’t _have_ to until he met up with Shatter. That was probably setting the bar too high, realistically speaking, but a little false hope couldn’t hurt.

The eastern horizon (_that_ would take a while to get used to) was beginning to glow a dim shade of greyish-blue, and Dropkick realized with a sinking and yet somehow resolved feeling that he was going to have to get moving. He had no idea where Shatter was, and she had no idea where he was, so there was no point in trying to meet up with her before looking for Bumblebee—whose signal, conveniently, had gone silent since the incident with Cliffjumper. As an educated guess, he had landed somewhere toward the middle of the continent, and the signal had last been sourced on the western coast. Taking everything into consideration, it would appear that he had no choice but to head west and hope for the best.

Dropkick sat there for some time, turning his plan over in his mind as the sky brightened. The stars winked out, one by one; somehow, that solidified in his mind that Shatter really wasn’t going to come, and for all intents and purposes he was now on a solo mission. When the first golden rays of sunlight gently kissed his face, he sighed heavily and got to his feet. He might as well just get this out of the way.

Cautiously testing his ankle, Dropkick scanned his immediate environment again now that the sun was up. In daylight, Earth seemed much more flat and featureless than it did at night, and he found himself hoping that the western coast didn’t look like this, too. He had lived near a small mountain range on Cybertron, and had never been one for the plains. He took a small step forward, grunting when his left foot hit the ground. It felt much better since he’d reset and rested it, but it was still nowhere near full functionality, and he definitely had a limp. All that aside, he didn’t feel quite up to transforming, either. After hesitating and weighing his options for a moment, he sighed again and continued his faltering progress westward, his attitude echoing the sun hanging low in the sky at his back.

He hoped that whichever maintenance glitch had deemed his pod flightworthy had had their head shot off by Optimus Prime himself.

❖

"Seriously?” Dropkick muttered.

It was already past noon—Earth-cycles were much faster than Cybertron’s—and while he hadn’t made as much progress as he would have preferred, he also thought he was doing pretty well, given the circumstances. He had been lost in thought, wishing he had some good music to listen to, when the smell had first hit him. It was markedly different from the regular Earth-smell, which he’d already gotten used to, and he had never smelled anything quite like it before. It almost smelled like the factories on Cybertron, but even that wasn’t an accurate description. He already hated it. Ignoring his misgivings, he had continued onward, dreading what he might find.

It had not been long afterward that he had begun to hear the sounds of what appeared to be Earthling transportation, driving on some sort of primitive road. Combined, the two seemed to be the source of the odor. He had dropped down to his stomach out of instinct to observe when he’d gotten within visual range, and he wasn’t happy with what he’d found.

He almost hated Bumblebee more for choosing Earth as a hiding place than keeping the war going by being an Autobot. Aside from the fact that Earthlings were organics, which was a major letdown in and of itself, they were _small_ organics driving _small_, beyond-archaic vehicles that Dropkick could easily crush with his bare hands. Normally, that would have made him happy—if he wasn’t going to have to take on one of said vehicles’ forms, of course. His natural alt was at _least_ one-and-a-half times as large as what appeared to be the most basic transport on this godforsaken planet, and the last thing he felt like doing was undergoing any kind of notable mass displacement with an injured ankle. But, once again, it looked like he didn’t have much of a choice.

Growling low with frustration, Dropkick prowled closer to the road, scanning for a suitable disguise and cursing the irritating yellow criminal to the pits for his trouble. At a glance, the larger Earthling transports seemed more appealing, but they were towing trailers, and he didn’t want to risk the native squishies thinking it strange that he didn’t have one. Resentfully watching one drive by, he waited for another basic vehicle to come along, trying to convince himself that maybe transforming wouldn’t hurt as badly as he thought it would.

He took the form of the first one he saw, which was after several big ones had passed. It hurt just as badly as he had initially expected, his ankle popping threateningly as he shifted. Swearing to himself to cope with the pain, he shot through the grass and merged wildly onto the road, ignoring the irritating honks of the bloodbags in their transports. So much for not encountering any indigenous lifeforms before he met up with Shatter.

It didn’t take long for him to grow accustomed to his temporary new form, and as soon as the sharp ache had subsided to a dull throb, he sped up—likely much faster than what was technically permitted, and feasibly faster than what was possible for true Earthling vehicles. But he was in the middle of nowhere, and he seriously doubted Earthling law enforcement was much more efficient than their modes of transport.

Primus, he already hated this place.

_Frag you too, Bumblebee,_ he thought sourly. _Frag you, too._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anybody as moody as Dropkick, is a mood.


	2. Chapter 2

Although it was “Mundane Monday,” as Cynthia liked to call it, the workplace was in a buzz when she arrived late that morning. While she was privately happy that something exciting was happening for once in her life, it also contrasted with the beautiful day and peaceful drive she’d had to work. Sitting down at her station, she turned to her neighbor, Gladys, and put on her headset. “What’s going on?” she asked, unsure of how concerned she should be. Had there been a breach?

“Two unidentified objects crashed last night—one in the southeastern corner of Utah and one in central Texas,” Gladys replied, eyes never leaving her screen. Cynthia started—that wasn’t all that far away. “We picked up a strange signal that appears to be of extraterrestrial origin from the Utah site,” she continued, “but it went silent. No one has been able to decode it. It popped up one other time, this time in south_western_ Utah, but we haven’t heard it since.”

Cynthia frowned. Whatever the thing was, it wasn’t wasting any time moving. “What about the other site—the Texas site?”

Gladys finally looked at her, leaning back in her chair and shrugging. “Haven’t heard from it. They think the alien might’ve died in the crash. They’re sending a team from ‘Paso to back us up in case it survived and it’s hostile, and another one from Gila to investigate.”

Something about how sure the higher-ups sounded that hostile extraterrestrials were to blame worried Cynthia; perhaps it was the last encounter Sector 7 had had with an alien, which had not gone well. Were the incidents connected? “Do you think...?” she began.

“That’s what it’s looking like,” Gladys said grimly. She leaned forward again in her chair, cracking her knuckles and returning her attention to the screen. “For now, our job is to track the one in Utah down. I sent you the sound file.” And with that, she was lost in her work once more.

Turning to her own screen, Cynthia opened the file and listened to it. There weren’t words to describe the sound accurately, simply because she’d never heard anything quite like it. Gladys had said that no one had been able to decode it, and Cynthia wasn’t sure anyone ever would. It was, after all, certainly not of terrestrial origin—she was pretty sure even the Russians couldn’t pull something like this off. _More aliens,_ she thought.

What did they want? Why were they coming to Earth? Surely there were other, more accessible worlds that possessed whatever it was they were looking for. If humanity had only encountered one race of aliens so far, it stood to reason that Earth was pretty backwoods in space-terms. It was unfortunate that she didn’t have more time to think about it right now. Sighing and setting her questions aside for the time being, she settled down and got to work.

❖

“I’m getting the signal again!” Jimmy exclaimed suddenly from Cynthia’s other side, breaking the lull that had descended earlier. In his office behind them, their boss, Cal, scrambled up from where he’d been reclining in his chair and exited his office. “Coordinates!” he barked, the return of his take-charge attitude sparking his subordinates into a flurry of renewed activity.

“First emitted at 36.21896 degrees latitude, -115.12203 degrees longitude, but it looks to be in motion,” Jimmy replied. Cynthia could tell he was proud of himself; she might have been proud of him, too, if he weren’t such an arrogant prick.

Someone had pulled up a satellite image of the region almost before Cal even had to say anything. _Damn, we’re efficient,_ Cynthia thought. “So it’s in ‘Vegas,” Gladys said, sounding incredulous for some reason.

“Looks like it got on an interstate,” Cal mused aloud. “Put a mark on it. It’s moving much slower than it was initially.”

“Must’ve gotten lost or something,” Cynthia snorted. She’d never been there, but the web of intersecting highways in the metropolitan area looked like a mess. She stared up at the satellite image, thinking. It was heading west, clearly very purposefully. Whatever the alien was doing, it wasn’t random—that much was obvious. She thought it odd that it hadn’t headed to look for the Texas arrival; what was so important about heading toward the Pacific coast?

“...proves that it’s probably the same species as that thing that landed last month in Cali,” Jimmy was saying, almost boastfully. “It would explain why no one has any sightings to report—it took the form of a car.”

The pieces clicked together then. _That’s the missing link. How the hell did I miss that?_ “It’s headed for California,” Cynthia said suddenly, not really caring if she had interrupted her big-headed coworker.

Jimmy gave her a look. “Yeah, no duh, Cynthia,” he deadpanned.

Mirroring his expression perfectly, Cynthia shook her head. “No, you don’t get it: it’s headed _for_ California. Not toward, _for_. It’s going to the initial crash site—the very first one. The Burns site.”

Fortunately, Cal’s intelligence was not nearly as eclipsed by his pride as Jimmy’s, and he caught on before she’d even finished her thought. “That...you’re right. That’s gotta be where it’s headed,” he agreed, turning on his heel and heading back to his office. “I’m going to call ahead and have them send a team to that location to intercept the alien. Keep a sharp eye on it. If anything significant happens, I expect to be notified immediately. Bust the door down, I don’t care.”

After the door had shut, Jimmy gave Cynthia a dark look and returned to his station; she could have sworn she heard him call her a bitch under his breath. Feeling somewhat smug nonetheless for taking away his spotlight, she threw him an innocent, charming smile and sat back down. “Good job, Jimmy,” she said sweetly, as if nothing had happened. Then she pretended to not be aware of his existence and settled back into her routine.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's been a while, lol. Thank you all for your patience with my ridiculous update schedule :)

The sun was beginning to tint everything intensifying shades of gold as it approached the horizon, and due to his more relaxed mood, Dropkick could actually admit to himself that it was quite lovely. The landscape had gradually transitioned from grassy plains to a desert-like climate—the higher concentration of dust in the air must have been what made the sunlight seem more magical. Pessimist though he may have been, he was eager to see how it would transform the scenery during its last “hour,” the Earthlings called it, in the sky.

For the most part, Dropkick had had a rather pleasant drive thus far, previous inconveniences aside. He had spent most of his time learning the continent’s predominating language, which was called English, by surfing the radio stations he could access. It was a painfully primitive language, but aside from driving, he didn’t really have much else to do. In English, Earthlings were called “humans,” which he found to be an odd and seemingly random word for “people from planet Earth,” but he supposed they had to distinguish themselves from their less-sentient counterparts _somehow_. Ideally, he wouldn’t ever have to use this otherwise useless knowledge, but he figured that the logic of acquiring the skill was more solid than just winging it in the event that he directly encountered one of these “humans.”

Dropkick would have considered his journey for the past while almost perfect if he hadn’t come across any human settlements, but this unfortunately was not the case; the first city he’d driven through had been uncomfortably well-populated. For all their numbers, however, Earthlings seemed quite unobservant, and so aside from stomaching their nauseatingly fleshy smell, he hadn’t had any problems passing through. The other colonies along the highway had been essentially villages, and the long stretches between gave him plenty of time to calm his nerves from his first encounter with the human species en masse.

He sighed internally—not out of irritation, but unexpected contentedness. This reminded him why he spent most of his time alone, and why he had loved those long, lonely drives on Cybertron. It felt deceptively good to know that there were no battles to win or people to kill. He had time—just him, the road, and the sky. Nothing was expected of him, and there was nothing to give. That, to him, was the definition of freedom. If those pit-spawned Autobots would just..._stop_, maybe he could have that all the time. The bittersweet moment of nostalgic peace was gone then, and Dropkick set his mind back on his mission.

A train of what looked to be armored vehicles passed in the opposite direction, catching his attention and immediately piquing his curiosity. What little he did know about Earth culture, he was fairly certain that average citizens weren’t in possession of those types of transports. Wherever they were heading, he wagered that human leaders had something to do with it—and if Earth was anything like Cybertron, they likely had the best technology the species had to offer. Before he could talk himself out of it, he whipped himself left (at an angle far too sharp for genuine Earthling machinery, he belatedly realized) across the median strip and careened into the eastbound flow of traffic, nearly colliding with a semi as he did. He’d done it—there was no turning back now.

_Shatter would _never_ have let me do that, _he realized with an almost exhilarated sense, resisting the urge to transform and blow the angrily honking drivers and their cars into the next realm. It was probably one of the most reckless things he’d done since he’d told Starscream to suck his spike. The freshly-throbbing portion of his foreign chassis agreed with Shatter’s voice scolding him in his head, which also reminded him how counterintuitive it felt to be driving _away_ from Bumblebee’s last presumed location. Forcing down any apprehension that was aroused, he told himself that whatever tech the human government owned, he could likely put to good use finding the fugitive—or maybe even Shatter herself.

He just hoped he hadn’t been impulsive on a false instinct.

❖

Not long after he turned around to trail them, the suspiciously out-of-place transports took an exit onto an unpaved road that led, ostensibly, to nowhere. It was then Dropkick triumphantly realized that he was onto something; these humans were definitely connected to the government. It seemed common knowledge for people in power to conceal their secrets where ordinary citizens wouldn’t be likely to stumble upon them—and given how ditsy the foolish bloodbags on the radio had seemed, Dropkick was willing to bet that this government had a _lot_ of secrets. It was a mistake the leadership on Cybertron had made before the cracks in society had started to show, and it was partially responsible for the start of the war. He wondered how long it would be before humanity met the same fate.

The Earthlings didn’t seem to realize they were being followed, and despite that being an indication that Dropkick had taken sufficient measures to ensure he wasn’t noticed, their obliviousness almost scared him. There was always a chance, after all, that they _did_ know they were being shadowed, and their perceived inattentiveness was merely a front to lure him into a trap. _That’s ridiculous, Dropkick,_ he told himself. Must have been the war trauma talking—everything on this world was so unevolved, he was fairly certain even the government wasn’t in possession of anything that could cause him any serious damage. Just to make himself feel better, he bet himself he could defeat an entire army of humans alone—_with _a damaged ankle. After all, that was what squishies like them generally did when they tried to go up against Cybertronians: they squished.

The sun set in a satisfying flourish of colors as the humans continued into the desert wilderness, and twilight was beginning to settle when, about twenty miles off the highway, they stopped. Dropkick followed suit as soon as he saw their brake lights activate, having no intention of closing the distance he’d circumspectly put between them, and watched.

Frag—human sentinels. There was no doubt they wouldn’t let him through in this form. He supposed the easier solution would be to take on the appearance of one of the armored cars, but for all their stupidity, the bloodbags’ suspicions would certainly be alerted when they saw there was no driver. He could already see that he was going to have to reveal himself at some point, and Dropkick wanted to put that off as long as possible—not because he didn’t want to be forced to show himself and eradicate their disgusting civilization, but just because he was lazy and injured and he _preferred_ to be left the frag alone. He sat there for a moment, irritably watching the train he’d been following pass through the gates without him as he scrambled to conjure up a way to get in without being immediately noticed.

_Ugh, primedammit._

The ombre shades of blues and lavenders in the darkening sky, while far too breathtaking for his freshly re-soured mood, also gave Dropkick an idea: his key was nightfall. He’d gleaned that humans could not see particularly well in the dark, which wasn’t a surprise simply because they were such a disappointing and pathetic species in general. It didn’t look as if the fence was actively patrolled, so if he went off the road by foot and stepped over it a little ways from the entrance, he would have a better chance of accessing whatever tech the humans were hiding before he was discovered and they tried to take him down. From there...well, he’d just have to wing it, like he usually did.

_And Shatter says I’m too impulsive,_ he thought smugly, quite pleased with himself and his strategy, and waited like a hunter on the prowl for the last traces of sunlight to disappear from the horizon.

❖

Dropkick crouched a small distance from the edge of the outpost, scanning the area. Thank Primus he hadn’t had any problems getting in. Humans with primitive weaponry were milling about, and he assumed that activity levels here had gone up since the arrival of the armored vehicles. It was ultimately inconsequential—what held his interest was a large, dish-like object with an antenna pointing toward the sky. He guessed it was some kind of rudimentary receiver and/or transmitter, and he was certain he could put it to better use than the humans. The satellites in orbit were likely there for surveillance purposes as it was, and that made his task even simpler. Ideally, he’d be back on the road before sunrise, knowing precisely where Shatter and maybe even Bumblebee were.

Satisfied with how smoothly things were going, Dropkick got to his feet, still noticeably favoring his left ankle. Transformation had been quite painful, and it had sent fresh, aching waves throbbing through the joint. He would have to take special care to conceal his injury when the humans became aware of his presence—

“HEY!”

He looked down to his left, barely startled. A human guard stood a couple of paces away, gun aimed somewhere at his head. This was the first time Dropkick had seen one that wasn’t in a car, and he was repulsed to see that they closely resembled his people in basic structure. He felt almost disgraced. _As if them being organics wasn’t bad enough._

Giving the man an “oh, please” look, he folded out his cannon.

“DON’T MOVE!” the guard yelled, tightening his grip on his gun and adjusting his stance.

He was a splatter of gelatinous goo on the earth before Dropkick’s cannon had even finished charging up.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all, read up! <strike>Happy coronavirus quarantine bingeing</strike> (Disclaimer: I have an extremely dark sense of humor okay don't @ me)

Cynthia yawned loudly, taking the extra time for the water to heat up before washing her hands. Her shift was almost over, but she was still extending her bathroom break—stalling, in other words. Nothing particularly interesting had happened since Jimmy had caught the alien’s signal earlier—after slowing in Las Vegas, it had picked up speed on Interstate 15 to Los Angeles, where it had once again slackened its progress as it picked its way through the tangle of roads. Proving Cynthia’s point, it now looked as if it were trying to figure out how to get north—toward the site of the initial crash. Jimmy had been less than happy to concede, and she had been more than happy to watch him struggle against his pride. Cal had informed them that a team in California was heading to intercept the extraterrestrial not long after he’d gotten on the phone, and aside from coming out for occasional updates, he’d stayed in his office for most of the day. Cynthia didn’t blame him.

Her thoughts turned towards the aliens themselves as she leisurely coated her hands with soap. Maybe they weren’t looking for anything at all from Earth. She wondered if perhaps the three recent arrivals were a family, accidentally separated during their travels of the galaxy. That would be a cute story; if it was true that they were kin, it was sweet that the other two had come for their lost relative. She found herself worrying for the alien that had landed in Texas in light of her little narrative; they still hadn’t heard anything from the site or the surrounding area, and while the Gila unit hadn’t reached the location yet to confirm that it was deceased, she almost hoped that it had survived for the sake of its theoretical family.

“Ugh,” she said aloud, turning off the water and shaking her head. She was too compassionate and imaginative for her own good sometimes, she could swear. The story went that the California arrival had run into the forest after crash-landing on a Sector 7 training site, and when reinforcements were called to corner it, it called an airstrike on them of which Agent Jack Burns was the sole survivor. That had been humanity’s only direct encounter with an alien species, so it made more sense to be concerned about national security than the extraterrestrials’ wellbeing. _Get it together, girl, _she told herself, shaking her head again and heading for the door. _Your shift’s almost—_

She froze suddenly, listening. The water running, in combination with her own thoughts, had muted the shouting and staccato rhythm of gunfire outside. Someone elsewhere in the building activated the alarms at the exact same time as the structure shook with an explosion, the lights flickering. Cynthia jerked the door open to find that chaos had descended; for all she could tell, people were just running around and shouting gibberish to one another. And much like earlier that day, she had no idea what the hell was going on.

There were horrible pounding and cracking sounds from the roof as Cynthia ran toward Cal’s office, dodging falling debris. She risked a glance up and saw that something looked like it was literally punching its way through the ceiling; there was a flash of metal through one of the holes, and then the lighting flickered out and did not come back on again. _What the fuck? _she thought. “Cal!” she yelled into his office, and found that it was empty. He was probably outside in the fray...or following Code Red protocol. Cynthia’s breath caught in her throat. If she wanted to have any chance of surviving this, she needed to get out of the building.

The powerful impacts on the roof continued to rattle the battered base as she ran for the exit. Whatever their attacker was, it would be through in a matter of seconds at this rate. _Don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic, _she repeated to herself, over and over. Although she had always been told she reacted well under pressure, she was fairly certain that she had never been more terrified in her life than she was tonight, so that probably didn’t apply. The door had been badly dented, and Cynthia was horrified to find upon forcing it open that it had been caused by a human body, which lay unmoving at her feet. _What. The fuck?_ she thought again, more out of a lack of remembering what else to say than anything. What could possibly have the strength to do this? What was going on?

Outside was even more pandemoniac, and aside from smoke, flames, and gunfire, she still couldn’t tell what on earth was happening. Detachedly, she looked around, marveling at the destruction and chaos surrounding her. It was all starting to become a blur, her mind struggling to keep pace with the rapidly changing events. _Just a few minutes ago, I was stalling in the bathroom, trying to avoid finishing my shift,_ some withdrawn, calm part of her brain oh-so-helpfully pointed out. _Funny how quickly things can fall apart, isn’t it._

She was forcefully yanked from her trance-like state by a resounding _crack!_ from the building behind her, and Cynthia dimly realized that she needed to snap out of it. Standing frozen with fear was a perfect way to get herself killed, and she wasn’t quite ready for that yet. Agents ran past her toward her left, shouting to each other and firing up at the heavens, before disappearing into a haze of smoke and dust. She stumbled backwards, slowly bringing her gaze upward to where their target had to have been.

A twenty-plus-foot-tall robot was tearing its way into their outpost. After freezing for a moment out of fear and shock and terrible awe, Cynthia finally regained control of her body, and then she ran.

❖

Pausing periodically to pop his squishy assailants or destroy their weaponry, Dropkick punched and tore his way into the human structure, having decided that shooting the roof in would increase the risk of damaging the tech inside. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t make good use of their ancient transmitter without it, but it would probably make it easier—almost like an instruction manual for something so _primedamn old_ that no one even remembered how it worked.

The sound of one of the humans’ more threatening firearms rotating to take aim from atop an armored vehicle caught his ear; only slightly diverting his gaze and mostly relying on his doorwings to aim, he shot it nonchalantly, satisfied with the fireball it created almost instantaneously. The humans, as was to be expected, had not taken too kindly to seeing one of their own reduced to a gooey mess, and they had opened fire on Dropkick almost immediately afterward. Any apprehension he’d had about their martial capabilities had evaporated the instant he noticed how harmlessly the tiny projectiles from their pitiful little guns plinked off of his armor. Staring down at them, almost amused, he had smirked to himself—_this is going to be fun_, he’d thought. And he hadn’t been wrong—the way the Earthlings popped in the wake of his cannon was more gratifying than he could ever have imagined. So long as none of their slimy remains splattered him, this was actually the most fun he’d had since landing on this stupid planet.

The mildly bothersome assaults of the humans were thinning rapidly, leading Dropkick to believe that the majority of them had either perished in the explosions and resulting fires or fallen directly victim to his far superior armaments—a single cannon, he realized with a mixture of disgust, disbelief, and bemusement. The battle almost hadn’t been an effort at all on his part—frag, he could probably have dramatically limped onto the premises and_ still_ taken them down without an issue. Half-firing indiscriminately to his right and kicking aside the remaining humans that attempted to flank him from his left, he tore off much of the roof’s remnants with a grunt and threw the chunk at the armored transports; even if their plating prevented them from being completely crushed, the weaponry on their rooves had certainly been decommissioned, and he doubted they would find driving out of the rubble a simple task.

He was in. Primus, that had been easy. If this was the best humanity had to offer, he could probably take over the entire planet within the span of a few Cybertronian days.

_What a pathetic species._

“HEY, ALIEN!” a voice shouted.

❖

Cynthia found the detonator not far from where it had been broken out of its box, lying in a slimy mess on the ground. She hadn’t been able to figure out for the life of her where the gelatinous substance was coming from (likely because she was too terrified to think straight), but it had a very unpleasant odor and coated the device in just enough slip that it threatened to drop from her shaking hands on multiple occasions as she ran for cover. She was completely unarmed, and even in her terrorized state she managed to deduce that Code Red protocol would likely be forgotten if she, too, became a victim of collateral damage. Crouching behind the twisted, warped wreckage of a smoking Humvee, Cynthia covered her ears against the horrible sounds of war and squeezed her eyes shut.

_Calm down,_ she told herself, taking gasping, quivering breaths. _Calm down. You’re gonna be fine. You’re gonna be all right. You’re gonna be all right._

Slowly, her breaths evened out, the fiery cacophony seeming to fade into the background of her mind as she focused on her breathing. Her thoughts drifted to the aliens that had crashed a day ago, and her brain hazily made the connection that the creature that had just wrought such havoc on Sector 7’s Wilds base was probably one of their kind—maybe even the Texas arrival that had been so deceptively silent. How foolish they all had been! Had it been playing them this whole time?

Something similar to anger began to rise in her chest even as she became aware of the relative quiet that was descending upon the devastated outpost; the skirmish must have been over. She couldn’t believe she had let herself fall for this, and she couldn’t comprehend how something so advanced could prey on a race so comparatively unevolved without even batting an eye. It looked as if Burns had been right about them after all.

Still frightened and pride wounded, Cynthia looked down at the detonator in front of her. She could still teach this motherfucker a lesson. Picking it up and getting to her feet with a swell of unanticipated and perhaps brash dauntlessness, she stepped out from behind her cover.

“HEY, ALIEN!”


	5. Chapter 5

Immediately after she’d spoken, Cynthia’s sudden burst of bravery conveniently vanished, leaving her exposed and cursing her impulsivity. A chill coursed through her body as the alien turned and looked at her, and she found herself frozen on the spot as its smoldering, vermilion gaze bored into her. It was beautiful, she thought unexpectedly—powerfully built, humanoid in form, made of gleaming metal that should have looked dead but somehow conveyed _life_ in the way that it reflected the firelight. “I—” she faltered, staring wide-eyed up into its face. She hadn’t thought things out this far—she actually hadn’t really thought things out at all, if she were to be completely honest. “I—I know...I know what you’re looking for,” she finally stammered, some instinctual part of her taking over before she could conjure up a viable plan.

“Is that so.” The alien’s voice was almost inhumanly deep, with a nearly-but-not-quite husky quality, and Cynthia shuddered at the vibrations his last spoken word had sent through her chest. She nodded numbly, her tongue cleaving to her palate. She’d run out of words already. This had been a horrible idea. For all its flaws, at least she wasn’t dead yet; the alien must have decided to humor her. He turned to face her fully, his body language almost conversational but still patronizing enough that she felt somewhere between insulted and thoroughly intimidated. “And what might I be looking for, then?” he asked almost sarcastically, shifting his weight and cocking his head slightly.

Cynthia swallowed, still for all intents and purposes paralyzed by his gaze. “I know where your friends are,” she managed. “I know where they landed.”

The alien scoffed then. “That’s nice,” he said, and folded out his cannon. “But they’re not my friends, and I don’t care. You’ve overstayed your welcome, _human_.”

She suddenly found that, as he lifted his arm, she was able to move her limbs again, and she whipped the detonator remote up to face the ruined building. _I gave you a chance, alien, _she thought. The fear that had seized and numbed her was giving way to the initial anger borne of wounded pride, and even before she pushed the button, she could already feel the dark satisfaction that often accompanied karma welling up in her core. In the split second of his cannon charging up, she smirked at her idea of how the next several seconds would play out. “Eat this, bitch,” she muttered, and activated the detonator.

❖

The massive explosion that followed his brief discourse with the bizarre human female knocked Dropkick off balance before he could even finish comprehending what she had aimed at the structure and thinking “what the pit is _that_ thing”. War-borne reflexes activated by the blast, he was back on his feet in a flash, poised to kill and venting heavily. Only angry jolts of pain shooting up from his left ankle following its harsh contact with the ground pulled him from the smoky battlefield in his mind. Blinking as he was brought back to reality, he straightened and scanned the wreckage, mind still hazy from the unanticipated flash of PTSD he hadn’t known he had. The building, and everything in it, had been completely destroyed. Not even the transmitter/receiver had survived, and it was then the anger began to rise. That stupid, repulsive bloodbag had just set him back Primus knew how far; he shouldn’t have even bothered to humor her to begin with!

There was a cough and a groan from the ground off to his right, and Dropkick was both disgusted and enraged to realize that the filthy, sniveling creature had survived the blast. He stared down at her as she unsteadily got to her feet, clearly disoriented even if she was unfortunately not deceased. “You little—” he started, taking a step toward her. His ankle wasn’t having it, and he stumbled with a strangled sound when he tried to put his weight on it. He must have landed badly after the explosion, he realized, and silently cursed whoever was responsible for his malfunctioning pod once more. This was really starting to become a problem.

Despite the fresh pile of misfortunes that had been heaped upon him, Dropkick was somehow able to find amusement in the fact that the human female seemed just as surprised that he had survived the charges’ detonation as he was that she had. Their eyes locked, and for a moment they just stood staring at each other, both more discombobulated than they cared to admit. A number of impulses flashed through Dropkick’s mind, but none of them quite reached fruition, and he was left aimlessly clenching and unclenching his fist as he scrambled for something to fill the suddenly hollow space in his mind.

The human raised her chin almost defiantly, jaw set, and it was then Dropkick found his voice. “You little _glitch_,” he hissed, the harsh sound causing a flash of cyan to play across his mask. He couldn’t _believe_ his luck—just when everything had been smoothing out for him, of _course_ a measly little organic, of _all things_, had come along and messed it all up. At this point, he was almost convinced he would have been better off just staying on the highway until he reached the western coast.

“I—I know where your companion is headed,” she said, ignoring the barb. She hesitated, and then added, “And I know where the first arrival landed.”

Dropkick started slightly. So the humans knew Bumblebee’s whereabouts, and they had somehow figured out that that was where Shatter was heading. Had his ego not been so inflated, he would almost have been impressed. The female’s eyes flicked down to his balled fist; her expression had become almost cunning, and it immediately put him on his guard. “But I can’t help you if you kill me,” she finished slowly.

He barked a coarse laugh, privately pleased with how successfully he’d concealed his surprise. “You can’t _help_ me, fleshbag,” he scoffed. Who did she think she was? “I’ll just find another one of your pathetic stations, and I won’t make the same mistake of trying to kill everyone there before I hijack your ‘tech’.” He narrowed his eyes at her, partially out of wary frustration at what she was trying to pull on him and partially to conceal a wave of throbbing pangs in his ankle. “That doesn’t necessitate your survival in the _least_.”

The human didn’t respond immediately, and Dropkick was willing to wager that her pitiful organic audios were still recalibrating from the overwhelming volume of the explosion—if they were even capable of doing _that_. Primus; Earthlings were so pathetic, he almost hated them for it. When she finally did reply, it was with a short laugh of her own. “You really think you can just find another one of these places?” she said. “Well, good luck with that, E.T.—they’re not that easy to come by. You’re not gonna have time to go looking for another one, either, if getting to California is as urgent as it seems.” One corner of her mouth was quirking up slightly, and it was beginning to dawn on a horrified Dropkick that he had gotten himself into something he couldn’t just shoot his way out of. “So,” she continued, crossing her arms victoriously, “if you want to make finding what you’re looking for easier, _you’re gonna want me alive_.”

Something snapped then in Dropkick. Roaring out of sheer, raw fury, he brought his cannon to bear and took aim, inching forward slightly and arm flexing each time he tried to override logic and obliterate the fleshbag where she stood. She stumbled back, wide-eyed, any trace of a smile wiped from her face, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to fraggin’ fire. He wrestled internally with himself for what felt like eons, debating on the most reasonable course of action. He could just get back on the highway, he mused, and keep heading west, hoping to eventually reach his destination (California, apparently)—the human’s survival wasn’t required for that. As enticing as that sounded, he also couldn’t shake for the life of him the rationality of an indigenous Earthling directing him precisely to where he needed to be. Loath though he was to admit it, it would save him both time and energy.

“_Damn_ it!” he swore in his native tongue, looking out into the darkened desert. Shatter was right—he was too impetuous for his own good, more often than not, and it had ultimately led to him being outwitted by a pit-spawned _organic_. If Shatter were in his situation, he begrudgingly realized, she would probably concede the human’s point and spare her life, at least until she had served her purpose. Given how things had gone when he’d done them _his_ way, it was probably best to suck up his pride, listen to Shatter’s voice in his mind, and take the most “rational” course of action, even if it already was making his plating crawl beneath his armor.

Folding his cannon back into his arm with an angry jerk, Dropkick squared his shoulders, taking in a deep vent. “_Fine_,” he ground out at length, the word coming across as more of a growl than anything. He scowled down at her, glad she had no idea just how much it pained him to do this. “So tell me how to get to California, squish.”

❖

Cynthia let out a quivering breath she didn’t know she’d been holding, tentative relief washing over her. She couldn’t believe that had worked—the alien had recognized her usefulness and decided not to kill her after all. Sending a silent, grateful prayer up to the heavens, she re-crossed her arms, trying to make herself feel more confident and relaxed. She couldn’t deny that the motion probably looked as stiff and hesitant as it felt, and it didn’t actually help in the least. “No. I’m coming with you,” she said.

The alien started, eyes flashing briefly with what she could only assume was incredulity. “What?” was all he said, sounding remarkably unintelligent for such an advanced being.

“I said I’m coming with you,” Cynthia repeated, swallowing her trepidation. “If I tell you how to get there, you’ll kill me and go there yourself. I’m not stupid; I know that’s what you would do.”

He heaved an enviably massive sigh that reminded her of how she felt getting up every morning, turning away and staring up at the stars. She watched him think (or internally complain, or whatever it was he was doing), shuddering against how cold it suddenly seemed. Some curious, scientific part of her marveled again at the alien’s physique; she had been unpleasantly surprised to see that he’d been relatively unaffected by the explosion, and it made her wonder what his race’s basic elemental composition was. Sector 7 scientists would have a ball taking him apart and discovering what made him tick.

“Fine,” he huffed then, drowning out a small twinge in Cynthia’s conscience as the thought crossed her mind. She cleared her throat guiltily, as if he could hear her inner thoughts, and brought her eyes back up to his face as he turned his attention back to her. “As long as you get me _exactly_ where I need to be, I won’t kill you,” he said, regarding her with an impossibly stonier gaze. “That’s a big _if,_ fleshbag. Got it?”

Cynthia exhaled, raising her chin slightly with grim resolve and hoping she made it out of this agreement of theirs alive. “Deal, E.T.”

He said nothing after that, and despite the extensive reports that had been written on the Burns encounter, she was still rendered speechless when without further ado he transformed from a twenty-plus-foot metal giant into some kind of muscle car that looked like it existed to be flaunted. Blinking and wondering for a moment if she had finally lost her mind, she reached out to open the door on the driver’s side. “Passenger,” the alien’s unmistakable voice ordered brusquely via the radio, the door he’d indicated jerking open with just as much attitude as he’d had in his humanoid form. “Don’t even _think _about asking me why, bloodbag.”

This was going to be an interesting road trip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, just a heads-up for all my regulars (which - and this is a shout-out especially to my faithful readers and commenters [dropout_ninja](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dropout_ninja/pseuds/dropout_ninja) and Tapaz - I can't thank you guys enough for your patience 😅): this is the last chapter that I've fully written out to date. I have no intention of dropping the story, so no need to panic; there'll just probably be a much longer hiatus than usual between this chapter and the next.
> 
> In the meantime, if you happen to remember that this story exists, feel free to harass me in the comments about continuing it, lol. I could always use a little extra motivation.


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